How about a bandit faucet?

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First, an observation - there are too many flippin' bandits. They're everywhere. They wreck caravans, kill peasants, and generally disrupt the economy and nobody seems to care. The nobility is always marching off to war while the countryside is on fire. That's not how it's supposed to work. The local lords should care about keeping order. A lot. That's the whole point of having local lords.

That said, it seems like bandits exist, primarily at least, to give the player something to farm. So we need them.

So how about a (metaphorical) bandit faucet?

What if the local lords dealt aggressively with local bandits - so the faucet is off and there are fewer bandits worldwide - but they were also willing to pay the player to do it for them - thereby turning on the faucet and introducing a local bandit supply for the player to hunt? That way there could be order and prosperity in Calradia but the player would still have an immersive way to farm bandits. When the player moved on to bigger and better things the lord would resume suppressing bandits themselves.

As a bonus, the system would also scale up depending on who hires the player for bandit duty. Early on you could work for a small lord with just a castle and a village or two. I bit later you could work for a bigger lord with more territory. Ultimately you cold work for the king and patrol the whole kingdom. It could be an alternative/supplement to a smithing or trading start.

Thoughts?
 
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Worked fine in Warband. Added abit of flavour and allowed weak players to jump in battles between them early days.
Gotcha. I don't know that I've ever needed to jump into another fight though. Bannerlord's not as hard as War Band. The groups are generally small at the start and it's easy to collect a party of 10-15 guys to fight therm.

I'd appreciate system where lords had contracts available to patrol their territories and wandering manhunters (including the player) could take them on, but I think I like my idea better because:

1) It's a bit less cumbersome - lords take care of their own backyards and will pay the PC to do it if they volunteer for the job. Simple. Plus the faucet is always available if I want to turn it on. I like that better than competing with manhunters.

2) It would give the AI lords a way to constantly level their own troops, so there'd be less trash in armies. The last couple patches addressed that some by making higher level units available for hire, but this would compliment that.

3) it would give the AI lords something to do other than constantly going into needless wars. They shouldn't even be allowed to enter an aggressive war until they clear out all of the bandit hideouts in their territory.

But yeah, if my idea is rejected (as it surely will be) then manhunters would at least be something. There are too many flippin' bandits.
 
What if the local lords dealt aggressively with local bandits - so the faucet is off and there are fewer bandits worldwide - but they were also willing to pay the player to do it for them - thereby turning on the faucet and introducing a local bandit supply for the player to hunt?
Yeah I would like that. I think dealing with bandits and hideouts should be a normal part of the AI's routine.

We need the manhunters back.
Yes. Because tbh after a few weeks of the game I don't really want to fight bandits, having an option to send out manhunters for you fiefs (and for the AI too) would be really good.

2) It would give the AI lords a way to constantly level their own troops, so there'd be less trash in armies. The last couple patches addressed that some by making higher level units available for hire, but this would compliment that.

3) it would give the AI lords something to do other than constantly going into needless wars. They shouldn't even be allowed to enter an aggressive war until they clear out all of the bandit hideouts in their territory.
Yeah this is really important, the AI needs to do more beside raids and armies. If they really can't do it then maybe send out a man hunter party, or if the player has a fief they can do it too. But I agree the AI needs to to be doing this. I think it would be good for clans to have 1 party just for doing bandits and issues in their fief areas.

How about destroying bandit camps to reduce bandits ???

Simple Old answer.

.
Nope, waiting on the map takes too long to be worth it, TW doesn't value campaign time at all or something, only reason they would make you waste a whole day for something so trivial, don't even ask about the "I need access to the field..." quests or escort caravan. They really need to shape and make campaign time spent = value/reward/advantage, as is it's all over the place like they don't even consider it.

Also, as is, the game just poops out more hideouts and parties every day anyways with no consideration for anything, so the more you clear the more it makes. Oh you cleared all the ones in you area and nobody else in the world did? Guess where the games pooping out it hideouts and parties today....
 
We need the manhunters back.
How about we have the option as a lord to pay a sheriff to remove percentage of bandits? The more sheriffs you have in your territory the less bandits that spawn, at least that would go a long way to dealing with them. I think of all the features left out of Bannerlord from Warband the Manhunters was what bothered me the most.
 
How about destroying bandit camps to reduce bandits ???

Simple Old answer.

.
Bandits are a permanent, global problem. Me killing them is a temporary, local solution.

Here's the thing -

My suspicion is that bandits are only in the game as a leveling and training tool for the player. Once they've served that purpose they're just a needless disruption to the global economy. They're no threat to me, but they constantly chip away at peasants and caravans.

If my suspicion is correct then all those dead caravans and peasants are more or less unintended, or at least unnecessary, consequences of giving me bandits to farm. If that's the case then what we need is a way to keep the bandits available for the player to farm as needed while preventing them from disrupting the global economy with their shenanigans.

Having the nobles tend to them before looking for trouble abroad makes narrative sense, keeps them in check, gives the nobles something useful to do, and trains up AI troops. Allowing nobles to farm the job out to the PC makes keeps them available as a training and leveling tool.
 
Lol wtf is this :poop:? Do they remember me form past games and are waiting?
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It's day 4, why are there bandit parties right there! I was like that the whole way from battanian spawn to rhesos castle too!
@Duh_TaleWorlds I just want to say whatever mechanic is spawning so many bandit parties, it is annoying and you can do better.
 
Manhunters, yes, please! Bandit faucet is also a great idea, could be bound to the bandit caves, but I can't be assed to not "send troops" on that one and waste my time for these. Also one should be able to send Manhunters aloose in service to gain gold & renown!

Looters generally scale badly, too. Their troop tree is non existent, so in the late game, even 200 looters don't scare you and other lords, they are just annoying really. Looter parties that survive a year should be given a badass name and some better troops so they are worthy to be hunted and give you a better renown and some rare loot.

Since they make up half of the early game, and really no difference in late game, other than being annoying, they need some more twists.
 
Agreed, this needs to be addressed. In late game, looters hurt the economy/caravans and I'm sure it's not intended.

Manhunters seem an obvious fix, but these other ideas sound cool as well
 
First, an observation - there are too many flippin' bandits. They're everywhere. They wreck caravans, kill peasants, and generally disrupt the economy and nobody seems to care. The nobility is always marching off to war while the countryside is on fire. That's not how it's supposed to work. The local lords should care about keeping order. A lot. That's the whole point of having local lords.

That said, it seems like bandits exist, primarily at least, to give the player something to farm. So we need them.

So how about a (metaphorical) bandit faucet?

What if the local lords dealt aggressively with local bandits - so the faucet is off and there are fewer bandits worldwide - but they were also willing to pay the player to do it for them - thereby turning on the faucet and introducing a local bandit supply for the player to hunt? That way there could be order and prosperity in Calradia but the player would still have an immersive way to farm bandits. When the player moved on to bigger and better things the lord would resume suppressing bandits themselves.

As a bonus, the system would also scale up depending on who hires the player for bandit duty. Early on you could work for a small lord with just a castle and a village or two. I bit later you could work for a bigger lord with more territory. Ultimately you cold work for the king and patrol the whole kingdom. It could be an alternative/supplement to a smithing or trading start.

Thoughts?
Well Lords do hunt Looters/Brigands. Unfortunately they treat it more as a side gig, usually on their way to something, rather then their primary responsibility. Technically there are Quests to hunt down outlaws already.

I think the real problem is just how much they spawn. There's no real rhyme or reason to it. Sometimes you can travel and barely see any. Other times there will be literal dozens of them swarming the countryside. My other major issue is as you advance in Clan Level bigger and bigger parties form til you get to ridiculous 100+ parties. I mean how are a bunch of homeless people assembling into a warband? Who's leading or feeding them? It's not like they are Rebels or Slaves revolting against the system.

Looters should be capped at 20 man parties, but typically around 5-10 strong. There's no reason for anyone to fight Looters beyond the earliest stages of the game, and big Looter parties really just make it harder to level up fresh recruits anyways because you always lose some friendly troops in larger fights.

Ideally I think Looters should spawn from raided villages. That would make a lot more sense and add some consequence to raiding villages beyond just tanking the local economy for a bit. It would also make raiding an even more effective & heinous war tactic. My understanding of Looters is that they are desperate scavengers looking for any bit of gold/food to survive off (hence why they only attack those who are weaker then them). And less so actual criminals or outlaws.

Otherwise Looters/Brigands should only spawn from hideouts. Also Brigands should be capped at 100 man parties, but typically around 15-30 strong. Brigands shouldn't need to be bigger then that to attack Caravans (be nice if they raided villages too, but that could be potentially too chaotic). And a hideout should only form when a free standing Looter/Brigand party goes to a designated location to setup a hideout. I feel like it would be nifty if you could actually eradicate all known Looter/Bandit parties from Calradia once you conquer the map by simply hunting them all down. Make that a sort of end-game achievement if you want.

Of course the potential for outlaws to return would always be possible as soon as a village gets raided. And mercs and such will likely raid at some point, so true peace will never be feasible.


Manhunters wouldn't be a bad idea as others have suggested, especially if they spawn from a castle/town primarily to wipe out a hideout in their region (shouldn't just be the player's responsibility.) It just seems dumb hideouts will form and impose all sorts of penalties and no one but the player does anything about them.

Ideally the Manhunters goal is to reach the hideout to take it down, but they will engage any outlaw parties they encounter. If they survive and or make it to the hideout - it goes away. If not then the cycle continues. I would have 1 Manhunter party spawn (maybe 20-30 strong) once a hideout reaches max party capacity (think it is 3 parties now, but maybe it could be bumped to 5 or 6).
 
Bandits are a permanent, global problem. Me killing them is a temporary, local solution.

Here's the thing -

My suspicion is that bandits are only in the game as a leveling and training tool for the player. Once they've served that purpose they're just a needless disruption to the global economy. They're no threat to me, but they constantly chip away at peasants and caravans.

If my suspicion is correct then all those dead caravans and peasants are more or less unintended, or at least unnecessary, consequences of giving me bandits to farm. If that's the case then what we need is a way to keep the bandits available for the player to farm as needed while preventing them from disrupting the global economy with their shenanigans.

Having the nobles tend to them before looking for trouble abroad makes narrative sense, keeps them in check, gives the nobles something useful to do, and trains up AI troops. Allowing nobles to farm the job out to the PC makes keeps them available as a training and leveling tool.

Game is full of unintended, or at least unnecessary, consequences right now due to the way problems are resolved.

Snowballing for example. To counter it, they stuff up mercs, prisoners escape, recruitment, troop design and "diplomacy".

Outcome? Endless wars with nothing to show for it.

They could have simply addressed how fast kuzaits are compared to Sturgians and improve the auto calc formula which appears to be rather primitive. IIRC, in autocalc, Calvary > everything. Shouldn't it have been spearman > calvary > archers > spearman?
 
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